Heymans, Corneille Jean-Francois, << HY muhnz, kawr NY zhahn frahn SWAH >> (1892-1968), a Belgian physiologist (scientist who studies how living things function), was awarded the Nobel Prize in physiology or medicine in 1938 for his discoveries concerning the regulation of respiration. See Respiration .
Heymans’s principal research centered on the ways in which alterations in the functioning of the heart and respiratory system can occur as a result of other physiological changes, such as changes in blood composition. Heymans demonstrated the presence and function of pressoreceptors, pressure-sensitive areas in the wall of the carotid artery (one of two arteries carrying blood to the head). Pressoreceptors are sensitive to changes in blood pressure and help to monitor respiration and heart rate.
Heymans also discovered chemically sensitive areas called chemoreceptors at the base of the aorta (the main artery leading from the heart) and in the carotid arteries. He showed that these also help to regulate respiration by monitoring the amount of oxygen in the blood.
Heymans also investigated the physiology of brain circulation, the action of drugs in the lungs, and the survival and revival of nervous centers after the arrest of blood circulation.
Heymans was born in Ghent, Belgium, on March 28, 1892. He succeeded his father, Jean-Francois Heymans, as professor of pharmacology at the University of Ghent from 1923 to 1968. He also conducted research in Paris; Lausanne, Switzerland; Vienna, Austria; London, and Cleveland, in the United States.
